Open The Door
by WhiteLites
Summary: Damon and Elena are captured by a gang of vampire hunters. Will they be able to get past their complicated relationship and get out alive?
1. Chapter 1

Summary: Damon and Elena are captured by a group of vampire hunters. What will happen when they're thrown in the thick of things together? Will they be able to depend on one another to escape?

Will Elena be able to get past her hate and mistrust toward Damon?

My first Vampire Diaries fanfic!

I hope you like it. I'm not sure how many chapters it's going to have as of yet. Maybe around 3 or 4? I don't know.

This is also the first time I've written anything beyond a one-shot.

By the way, please review! If you I don't get that many, then I probably won't continue.

I have to know that my writing is actually being read and that I'm not just writing to a wall (figuratively speaking that is).

Delena :) I also hope that I keep these guys in character (especially Damon) because that's always the part I lover best. It has to seem realistic.

Oh well, here goes nothing!

**All I Need- Within Temptation**

Don't tear me down  
For all I need  
Make my heart a better place  
Give me something I can believe  
Don't tear me down  
You've opened the door now  
Don't let it close

"Hello Elena." Damon leaned up against the door to the boarding house, a crooked smile playing on his lips.

Elena kept her mouth straight, not betraying an emotion other that slight annoyance. "Is Stephan here? We were supposed to go out tonight."

"Nope. He's out hunting Bambi. You can come in if you like though, he should be back soon."

Should she go in? He had saved her life. Him and Stephan. It did ease the hate just a little bit in her heart. But still, they weren't friends. They never would be real friends again. You can't just forgive someone killing your brother because they got angry and cracked. That was the other reason she wasn't sure if she should go inside. Elena didn't trust him. What if she did something to piss him off and he ended up killing her?

"Fine." She walked inside. Damon closed the door behind her.

"Make yourself at home." His voice was monotone. "I'll be…around."

She picked sat on the couch near the fireplace, and stretched out her legs. Not seeing anything interesting to read on any of the tables, she shut her eyes.

Where was Stephan? He had said that he would meet up with her after school that day, yet he had never shown up. She thought the same as Damon. He must have gone out hunting on short notice. She hadn't wanted to bother him with a text or a call. But now, after a few hours, she was worried. Taking her phone out of her purse, she texted him a quick _"Where are you?" _

While she waited for a response, the minutes seemed to drag on and on. Her screen had long since gone black. When had she turned into this scared little girl? Stephan was a vampire. He should be able to take care of himself. She shouldn't worry him not texting her back. His phone might have gone dead or maybe there was no service where he was.

She sighed. Her breath caught in her throat when she felt her phone start vibrating. When she looked down, instead of seeing Stephan's number flash on the screen, she saw Damon's.

Was he messing with her? She had just seen him walk upstairs.

"Damon?" She whispered. Why did she whisper? There was no one else around in the house except for the two of them.

A loud crash echoed from somewhere above her head on the second floor. Elena was in her feet in two seconds, staring at the ceiling, phone shaking in her hand.

She realized that there hadn't been another voice responding on the phone. She checked to make sure Damon hadn't hung up. The timer still turned, proving that he hadn't. She thought she heard some yelling or muttering in the background, but there was too much static to make the words out.

"This is Elena Gilbert, correct?" The voice on the other end was definitely not cocky, or arrogant, Damon's usual tone. Instead it had a sort of strange accent to it that she couldn't place.

Gathering up her courage and pushing her fear to the side, she managed to keep her voice strong. "Why? Who is this?"

"I would suggest you answer the question, my dear, or I'll have to consult your friend here. Damon I believe."

"Yes, I'm Elena. Who are you?" Her voice wavered this time.

"That does not matter. Come upstairs now."

Fear clenched in her gut. Who was this guy? He had Damon and if she didn't go up there, this man would most likely stake him or something like it. But Elena shouldn't care about Damon, the same Damon who killed Jeremy and was pretty much a psychopathic alcoholic who cracked and killed people every once in a while just for the fun of it.

But it was the same Damon who had helped save her life. The Damon who she had once been close to. Damon, who was trying to be good and who had done good things in the past, even if they were few and numbered. Besides he was Stephan's brother. Stephan would go crazy if something happened to him.

"The clock is ticking. Either you do as I say, or Damon is as good as dead."

I heard a hiss and a groan in the background. Damon. What were they doing to him? The list of horrible things just stacked on top of one another. They had to be vampires, very powerful, very old vampires.

"Elena if you listen to them, I'll kill you myself!" Damon yelled from upstairs.

It only took me a few seconds to decide what to do. "Ok. I'll go."


	2. Chapter 2

**Hey guys! Sorry it took so long for me to post this chapter. You still love me, right? **

**Okay, so just an FYI, this is the same scene as last chapter, but it's in Damon's POV. We get a nice look at Damon's inner thoughts.**

**So, I hope you like it. **

**Please review and I'll try harder to update more often. :)  


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There were three swift knocks. But before there had even been one single knock, Damon knew that there was someone at the door, and that someone was Elena.

"Hello Elena."

She stared at him with her steady brown eyes. Her mouth was a straight line. He wished that for just once, she could smile at him and really mean it. But even that simple prayer or hope, or whatever you would call it was useless. She had made it absolutely clear to him that they were both done. Done for good. There was no going back to the place before he had "snapped" and killed her little brother. It was unforgivable, and in a strange way, Damon understood it.

It was why he didn't deserve her. He wasn't good. Damon wasn't a hero, never would or could be. It wasn't in him. That position was solely for Stephan, the poster child for self loathing and a mighty strong self righteous attitude. A cat can try to act like a sparrow, but it's never going to change anything.

But that never stopped anyone from trying, or dreaming.

"Is Stephan here? We were supposed to go out tonight." She responded, once again not meeting his gaze directly.

He had thought that saving her that day when she had been captured would somehow have changed things between them. In a strange alternative reality, it might have. When she had walked down the stairs, with that look of pure relief and love on her face, Damon wished so hard that it ached, that it was him she looked at.

But it never would be. For her it would always be Stephan. It would be Stephan until the end of time.

He had lost two girls to his brother. He was never the one who was "picked" or "chosen", he was always the rebound or the fallback brother. It hurt, even though he would never want to admit it. He did care.

But he still cared about Stephan and he cared about Elena. The only choice he had was to give up and give in. It was probably the most selfish thing he could have done to tell Elena that he loved her. It was why he made her forget. He cared to much to hurt her. He cared to much to ever let her be with him.

"Nope. He's out hunting Bambi. You can come in if you like though, he should be back soon."

Stephan had said that he was going out. Hunting, he had said, not out with Elena. He didn't want to worry her with that though.

She seemed to debate with her eyes if she should accept his offer or just go back home.

"Fine." She said shortly, walking inside. He watched her long dark hair sway as she stepped into the living room.

"Make yourself at home. I'll be…around." He knew that it would be torture if he stayed in the same room with her. He suddenly wondered why he even invited her in. He was afraid that he would snap again at any moment and she would be his victim.

He climbed the stairs to the top level of the boarding house, still smelling Elena's strong sweet scent. It clung to him like an unwanted perfume. He wanted to shower and just get rid of her completely.

He wished he had a switch for Elena, just like he did for his emotions. Everything would be so much easier and he could just go back to caring about Katherine instead. Katherine seemed ten thousand times easier to think about than Elena.

Because he had made her forget the one time he ever truly opened himself up to anyone.

He had lost his only friend because of his unstable nature and his constantly buried pain.

He leaned his head against the wall, taking an unnecessary breath. Things were never going to get easier. He wasn't the type of person who never really let go of love, or pain for that matter. The two were so strangely interconnected and inseparable.

He wanted to run. Run fast and far, far out of the country. Europe sounded great. No, not Europe, Katherine was from there. Maybe Egypt, that would be good. See the pyramids or something like that. Nothing like heat, sun and dust to make you forget about unrequited love.

Instead of running, he walked toward his room.

Some noise made him stop dead in his track. It could be Elena, because she was downstairs and the noise came from behind his doorway.

With inhuman speed, he ran into his room.

Something wet hit his face and his leather jacket and shirt. He barely stifled the yelps that were cause by the white hot fire that consumed ever inch of him.

_Vervain. _

What kind of smart asses were these guys?

He shot out blindly, hitting one square in the chest. It was a killing, not wounding blow. Damon could hear ribs crack and the wind come out from him as he collapsed on the floor.

But something hit him in the back and the next thing he knew, he was laying on the floor, next to the dead brown haired man that looked as if he could be Alaric's twin brother.

"Shit." He muttered, groaning from the sharp pain of the stake in his back. Luckily whoever had hit him was one hell of a bad stab. "You missed. In my book, missing equals one very pissed off vampire that you don't want on your tail for the next century and a half."

"I don't think I have to worry about that, Damon." The man's accent was lightly Italian.

Someone quickly grabbed his wrists and wrapped rope around his wrists and feet. The ropes burned like liquid fire against his skin. He let out a hiss of pain and tried to rip them apart to no avail. He even tried to slide his wrists out, but it was useless.

"The ropes are magic. It would be useless to try to get out of them." The Italian guy explained. He finally walked into view in front of Damon.

"Who the hell are you?" He already realized that none of the four guys were vampires. Damon wondered how they could have possibly made it into the old boarding house without being detected.

"You're worst nightmare, Damon Salvatore. We're the worst nightmare for any of your kind." His green eyes glinted. "Now to what we came for…"

"About that. You better just do whatever you had planned for me because I don't reason when there are threats involved. Especially when I don't trust that those threats will actually be carried through."

Italian man let out a low laugh.

It was Damon's last straw. The man and his band of little humans who had somehow crept into his home were dead. He was going to be swift, dealing the most painful deathly blow he could until he had ended every single one of their sad lives. They would be sorry that they had ever messed with a vampire and though that they could make it out alive.

He put all his strength into ripping apart the rope that bound his hands together. Once again, nothing happened. He let out a growl just as one man came out from the side of his vision and sliced him straight across the chest with a long silver blade.

The pain was unbearable. It also must have been somehow laced with Vervain. God, who the hell supplied them with all of it? After he had killed this little gang, he would slaughter that idiot and stick his head on a spike. No, that was way too ninteenth century. He need something new something original….

Another slice, this time kissing his cheek, woke him out of his reverie. Damon wasn't going to scream, though, he wasn't that weak.

The man wiped off the now bloody blade with the edge of his jacket.

Italian man clasped his hands together. "Go call our dear Elena Gilbert and nothing further will happen to you."

"No thank you. We're currently not on speaking terms. She hates me. I killed her brother." Damon said looked up at him. "I really doubt she would listen even if I told her that I'm being held in my room by a band of merry thieves led by the Italian Robin Hood himself.

He gave the man a full grin that looked more predatorial than anything else.

Italian man didn't smile. Instead, he looked at Damon's phone, which he now held in his hand. The screen flashed, lighting up the man's muscled arm.

Damon's smile faded. "Guess I was right about the 'thieves' part. Games over guys, give me my phone."

That made the Italian smile. He clicked a few buttons and held it to his ear.

Damon could easily hear Elena's phone vibrate down in the living room.

Anger suddenly burned in his gut. Why would this guy want Elena? Unless, of course he worked for Klaus and all these guys were actually compelled to carry out his dirty work. That fiery pit of anger turned immediately into the cold wave of fear.

He had to get out of these damn ropes or Elena was dead. Worse than dead, if that was even possible.


	3. Chapter 3

**Wow two chapters so soon? **

**Yes. Just to make it up to all of my faithful fans (you know who you are). :)**

**It's a quick read too and in Elena's POV just in case you didn't notice. **

_It's only love, it's only pain_

_ It's only fear, that runs through my veins_

_ It's all the things you can't explain_

_ That make us human._

Human-Civil Twilight

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"_The clock is ticking. Either you do as I say, or Damon is as good as dead."_

_ I heard a hiss and a groan in the background. Damon. What were they doing to him? The list of horrible things just stacked on top of one another. They had to be vampires, very powerful, very old vampires. _

_ "Elena if you listen to them, I'll kill you myself!" Damon yelled from upstairs. _

_ It only took me a few seconds to decide what to do. "Ok. I'll go."_

_

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_

The time it took to walk up those boarding house stairs seemed like an eternity. I was surely walking to my death and for what? To save Damon Salvatore? The same Damon Salvatore that had killed my brother because of the fact that I didn't love him back.

Yet it was also the same Damon that showed a different side when he had been given the chance. The Damon who had saved me. The Damon who did everything for love, no matter how warped it could turn out to be.

That's the Damon I was saving. It was the Damon that I thought of as my friend, who would do anything to protect me.

I stood at the top of the staircase. The whisper's of men's voices guided my shaking steps to the doorway to Damon's room.

My heart jumped in my throat when I saw the scene before me. Damon lay up against his antique four poster bed. His icy blue eyes were half closed, black circles hanging under his eyes. His face was half burned, red and torn up. He really looked like a true classic vampire at the moment. Like the living dead.

Ropes tied his hands and feet together. They left red, bloody rings around his hands. A line of pale, red tinged skin showed through his black shirt.

I held my hand over my mouth, stifling a scream. Damon, cocky, arrogant, Damon was lying on the floor, defeated. These guys were definitely worse than bad news.

"What did you do to him?" I asked breathless, looking up at the man who had walked over to stand in front of me. My glance couldn't stay still, though, because the room was strewn with unfamiliar faces and bits of gore.

I suddenly noticed that there was another man lying on his stomach on the Persian rug next to Damon. A picture of Alaric popped up in my head when I saw his messy hair and part of his now still and pale face.

A man stood straight in front of me, exchanging a few glances with his other friends who surrounded and watched Damon like wolves. He must have been their leader. His brow hair was only slightly striped with gray. He held a silver blade in his right hand. A smile graced his pale lips. "My dear, Elena." His accent had an Italian tint to it. "Our vampire here is only slightly immobile at the moment." He held out a hand to Damon's sprawled and broken form. "He will surely be dead in a few moments. In the meantime, I was hoping to have a nice discussion with you about a current predicament."

"About the fact that you just tortured my friend?" My voice cracked.

Again, the Italian cracked a broad, tooth filled smile. He glanced back at one of his men. "She must be under his spell." He said quickly, then turning back to me he matched my gaze. "You my dear are horribly mistaken. This man here is not your friend. He is a very bad and evil vampire that has tricked you into thinking the two of you are friends. As soon as we kill him, you will regain your clear thoughts."

The way he talked to me, as if I was a little five year old really angered me. He was a human, just like me. He couldn't do anything to me, not if he held these sorts of values against vampires. He wouldn't. My anger gave me the courage I needed to stand up to the Italian.

I walked closer, so that we were face to face, inches apart. "I'm not compelled, if that's what you're talking about. That vampire right there is my friend and if you don't let him go, then I'll fight you until my last breath."

His eyes flitted across my face. A man on the side of my vision moved and it took all my self control not to turn my gaze away from the leader's. It took me by surprise when I realized that he had stopped smiling. His face had gone completely still. The edges of his mouth twitched.

"Hm. The girl doesn't lie. It seems as though our plans have changed." He cleared his throat and turned away, facing the rest of the room, his back now turned to me.

"Elena Gilbert has made her decision to side with the vampires. It is our responsibility to respect the freedom of will and choice of all those who are human." He said quickly. "Arthur?" He called to one of his men. None of them moved.

Before I realized what had happened, there was a swift movement behind me and everything went black.

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**Awwww...really? A cliffhanger? What is wrong with you? **

**Yes, I know, I know. It's killing you, isn't it? **

**Please review? **

**I'll cry if you don't.**

**Just kidding. No, maybe not?**

**By the way, I'd like to thank those past 6 people who decided to review a few weeks ago! It means so much. *hugs***

**I LOVE YOU GUYS! :D  
**

**-_SweetestHurt_  
**


	4. Chapter 4

**Another chapter for you guys! **

**I know it's short... maybe I'll try to right longer ones over Christmas Break, but I don't have enough time as of now so you'll just have to wait. :) hehe.**

**By the way, thanks for all the reviews! You all make me keep on writing and updating this story right here. **

**Do you think Elena and Damon have been in character enough? **

**If so, please tell. **

**If not...well...just tell me what I can do different, okay? I promise I won't get mad. :D**

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"_Elena Gilbert has made her decision to side with the vampires. It is our responsibility to respect the freedom of will and choice of all those who are human." He said quickly. "Arthur?" He called to one of his men. None of them moved. _

_ Before I realized what had happened, there was a swift movement behind me and everything went black. _

_

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_

"Elena!"

Someone hissed. The sound echoed and seemed amplified in the place where I lie. I opened my eyes suddenly, blinking a few times to clear my sight.

"Damon?" I murmured, recognizing who it was by the shape sitting up against the opposite wall. His black hair was a tangled mess, and I could still see dried blood on his shirt and shadowed face.

We weren't in his sun filled room anymore. No, it looked more like the boarding house basement. The walls were gray stone. A bench sat to my right, far away from the wood door.

"Are we in the cellar?" I asked.

Damon groaned. "Yes, unluckily. Do you think you can take these damn things off me? I can't feel my hands."

I crawled over to where he sat. When I lifted up his bound wrists, he closed his eyes. His chest barely rose when he breathed. He was too still.

"Damon." I said aloud, worried.

He made a noise under his breath.

I slapped him.

"Elena!" His ice blue eyes flicked open. He glared at me. "What the hell?"

"Sorry, I'm just afraid that if you fall asleep you won't wake up again." I said simply, fiddling with the tight ropes. "Then I'll have to face these guys alone."

"No you won't." He said sharply. "Saint Stephan is probably on his way right now. Those cocky bastards will kill me and think that the job is done, but he'll be right behind them most likely with ax or something creative like that." Damon smirked. "Won't know what hit 'em."

"Don't say that. They would have killed you already if they really wanted to." I didn't look back up at him, instead I focused on trying to untie the various complicated knots.

My fingers suddenly touched something wet. I looked closely and saw red and raw burn marks that ran all over Damon's skin under the ropes.

"God, Damon, are these made of Virvain?" I stifled a gasp.

"Yep. And they're voodood too."

"You could have told me that. We need Bonnie." I dropped his wrists and rocked back on my heels.

"I don't think so. Knowing her, I think she may have made these for them."

"She wouldn't do that, Damon." I insisted.

"Whatever, I'm on her bad side. Really, I wouldn't be surprised if she hired these mobsters to do her dirty work."

"Mobsters?" I asked, my eyebrows raised.

"Well, not exactly." His eyes studied me. "From collected information, I'd say they're hunters."

"As in vampire hunters?"

"Yes, Elena. But I'm convinced that they've been compelled by Klaus." He explained.

That stopped me cold. I leaned up against the cold stone wall next to Damon and closed my eyes. This was not good.

If these vampire hunters were in the house, right now, then could there be others, maybe even vampires too, who planned on murdering my family and friends in the next few minutes? What about Stephan, had they already found him? My breath caught in my throat and I fought against the urge to cry.

"Elena." Damon whispered.

I wiped the tears that formed in my eyes. "What?" I said, looking straight ahead.

"We're going to be fine, alright?" Damon said softly. As always, I felt safer hearing his voice. "I won't let anything happen to you."

I believed him.

This was the difference between the two Salvatore brothers. Sure, I loved Stephan. He was my first love, my true love. But with Damon, I felt protected. I didn't know why, if it was his cockiness or the way his every move gave off the appearance of danger, but I knew, in my heart, that I would always be safe with him.

"We should try to fix those burns and that cut."

I ran my finger across the split in his black shirt. He flinched.

"Sorry." I said.

"Where's that First Aid kit when you need it?" Damon said sarcastically.

"This isn't funny, Damon. You're weak as it is. Are those ropes still burning you?" I asked.

"No. Their juice must have run out upstairs."

"Then why aren't you healing?" I asked, worry coloring my voice.

"It's the ropes." He said, shifting his position slightly. "Like I said, voodood."

I lifted up my sweater sleeve before I had the chance to change my mind. "Here, some of my blood has to help."

He narrowed his eyes at me. "No, Elena."

"Why not?" I asked. "You need all the strength you can get if we're going to fight those guys."

"_We _don't even know if the magic will just weaken me again. That would be a little pointless now, huh? Drinking your blood and getting back to where I started."

I wasn't giving up that easy. "That isn't the Damon I know. The Damon I know is willing to do anything to beat up the guys that threaten him and his friends."

"I guess you have a point." He said slowly. "But, if this goes wrong…"

"It won't, okay?"

"Fine."

I held up my wrist to him and closed my eyes. I felt the razors slide in gently, if that was even possible. A sharp strange pain twisted around my wrist and up to my shoulder. It was like being on fire, but in a good way. It was a warming fire that crawled through your veins and touched every single one of your nerves. I felt light as air.

_The world and my grip on gravity shifted slightly as I suddenly saw Damon standing in front of me. In fact, we were both standing. We were standing in my room. He was only inches away from my face. His eyes scanned mine. My breath caught. It was as if I was handing somewhere underwater, holding my breath and waiting to come to the surface._

_"I just have to say it once. You just need to hear it. I love you, Elena. And it's because I love you that I can't be selfish with you, why you can't know this." He took a breath and continued, his bright blue eyes never leaving my face. "I don't deserve you. But my brother does. God, I wish you didn't have to forget this. But you do." _

_ A single tear fell from his eyes. _

My eyes wrenched open as Damon released my arm as gentle as a feather.

I heard him break the ropes as easily as someone rips paper. The shredded pieces fell to the floor as he stood up and walked in front of me. He held out his hand.

I grabbed it, still stunned by the vision, as he lifted me to my feet.

"Those marks should heal in a few seconds, I…." He trailed off, eyebrows creased in worry. "Are you okay?"

I rubbed my forehead. "Yeah, I think so." I wasn't ready to tell him anything yet. The vision, it had to have happened when my Virvain necklace has miraculously appeared a few days ago. He had brought it to me. He had said those things to me, and made me forget. Why? Why did he make me forget?

"_I don't deserve you. But my brother does. God, I wish you didn't have to forget this. But you do."_

He didn't want to be selfish. Damon knew that I was better off with Stephan. Was that true, was he really right when he said that? He made me forget. Did that prove right there how much he loved me?

I suddenly wondered if Stephan would ever do something like that for me. Would he have the strength Damon did to let someone he loved go and be with someone else? Could he ever do what Damon did and continue to live on as if nothing had happened, as if everything was okay?

No, Stephan couldn't. As much as I could try and convince my thoughts otherwise, in my heart I knew that it was true.

Stephan would never be as completely selfless as Damon.

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**Ok, the whole Italian Mafia/Vampire Hunters/Klaus minion guys weren't in this chapter, I know. They might not even make it to the next one because I want to work on the whole Damon/Elena relationship that we all love sooooooo much. Am I right?**

**Hehe. Please review, friends. **

**~SweetestHurt  
**


	5. Chapter 5

**Sorry about the long lost update. It's been awhile and I've grown apart from this story :(.**

**But, hopefully I'll keep up from now on. I just don't know if I'll have the time. **

**It's a bit short but I hope you all will like it. :D  
**

**We all know that Reviews=3**

**-SH**

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Damon kicked the cellar door once more.

The noise rattled like a gunshot in the enclosed space.

I sat against the far wall, head in my hands. "It's no use Damon," I said finally, my voice raw.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. Do you have any better suggestions?" Damon snorted.

"Stefan _is _coming. He'll bring Bonnie if he has too."

"Oh, yeah, I forgot, about your man of steel. He's about…" He looked at his bare wrist mockingly. "Three hours late?"

"Stop it. There's no use in arguing. It's just going to make things worse."

"How can things possibly be worse?" Damon leaned against the cellar door, crossing his arms, visibly pouting.

"Don't be such a baby."

The cellar was silent for what felt like hours. Neither of us spoke a word. My breath was the only noise audible. Oddly enough, it wasn't really that awkward, just….well, just tense.

"How long has it been, do you think?" I asked suddenly.

"Three hours and forty two minutes." He answered, brushing the dust off his black shirt sleeve. The way he stood, his casual pose, gave him the appearance of a living shadow.

I thought for a moment, sudden despair gripping at me. "He's not coming." I picked up my head, putting my arms to my sides against the cold floor. "What if something happened to him? They must have caught him while he was hunting. Maybe it's Klaus. What if it was him, Damon? What will he do to him?"

His sharp, angular face, glared in scrutiny at the cement floor. "Nothing good, Elena, nothing good. Klaus likes pain." Damon said slowly. "Stephan most certainly isn't going to die."

What he said so differed from what Stefan would have said that it shocked me. Then I had to remind myself that this wasn't the kindhearted brother I was talking to. This was his bloody thirsty, prone to snapping, older brother.

I tried convinced myself that, had I been trapped down here with Stefan, things would seem much less frightening and hopeless. I knew that wasn't true, though. I was almost glad that Damon was here with me instead of Stefan. Damon brought me into reality. He never held anything back. He gave me what I needed. The truth. Whether it would help or hurt me was regardless. He knew the best thing in the end was honesty. That's what separated him from his protective brother. I could trust Damon in a way I would never be able to trust Stefan.

"_I don't deserve you. But my brother does. God, I wish you didn't have to forget this. But you do."_

His voice echoed on and on in my head. God, I wished I had never remembered that. It was too hard knowing how he truly felt about me. I knew that he loved me, sure, that much was all too obvious. But what he had said that night was different. It was as if I was seeing a whole new side to him. I was seeing the side that I had tried all too hard to bring out, but never seemed to surface for any amount of time. I had seen the selfless and true Damon. I felt as though I had seen something that I was always meant to see, but he was too afraid to show. This Damon, I knew, was my true friend.

I shouldn't have been thinking about him. I should be thinking about Stefan and how he was probably trying to get to me at this very moment.

Or not.

Maybe Klaus was currently torturing him. I feared the thought too much to think about it.

"Don't worry, Elena." His eyes flashed in my direction. "Knowing my brother, he's probably A-ok."

He walked over with his usual gracefulness and sat next to me. He looked a bit better since I gave him my blood. The marks on his wrists were all but gone, and he no longer looked weak enough to be blown over by a small gust of wind.

"How can I not worry?" I asked him. "And we don't even know what these guys really want from us."

Damon stiffened. "I told you before. They're probably sent by Klaus. They're going to hand you over to him once he's prepared. That means that you're going to be taken somewhere far from here and I'm not going to let that happen."

That was such a Damon thing to say. "I don't think you have any say in what they're planning. That much was obvious from they did to you earlier. Anything you try is just going to get you killed and I don't want that."

His eyes met mine. "Thanks for the concern." He said with sarcasm. "But I'll be fine. They're just a bunch of punk humans with too much knowledge for their own good. I won't make the same mistakes again." He smirked. "I have a plan."

"I'm being serious, Damon." I glared at him. "If you get yourself killed, that leaves me with no options of escape. Regardless of how well your plan is thought out-"

At that exact moment the cellar door gave a tiny clicked and opened.

The Italian stood in the doorway, the light above his head highlighting his harsh features.

"I seem to have found another one of your friends, Elena Gilbert."


End file.
